"On one hand, the book is a quick read, and yet what Padgett does with his sentences is to be savored ... He takes a deep pleasure in the words, their sounds and variable meanings ... All of it is marked by the ease of Padgett's writing, his unrivaled directness." --John Yau, Hyperallergic When the spinster Miss Helen Campbell sets off in a motorcar called "The Comet" with four high school girls, their cross-country...